DOWNERS GROVE, Illinois – After years of being known simply as the Craft Fair, the Downers Grove Junior Woman’s Club has renamed their signature event. Beginning today, it will be known as the Downers Grove Handmade Market. The refreshed name represents Downers Grove Junior Woman’s Club continued commitment to bring the newest artisans and undiscovered handmade goods to Downers Grove residents. In addition, the event will feature a craft project for the non-profit group, Operation Care Package.

“The Downers Grove Junior Woman’s Club Craft Fair has been a great local tradition for the last fifteen years,” says Anne Healy, DGJWC Club President. “We are excited about the new line up of artisans at the DG Handmade Market and we are pleased to feature Operation Care Package.”

The event takes place as part of the Rotary Grove Festival in Downers Grove, June 25-26 in Fishel Park, located on the north side of Grove Street just west of Main Street. DG Handmade Market will run from 9:00am to 5:00pm on Saturday, June 25th and from 10:00am to 4:00pm on Sunday, June 26th.

The DG Handmade Market offers a new and exciting mix of handmade products, live music, a community service project, and several local not-for-profit booths. Nearly 50 crafters will showcase the newest trends in the handmade marketplace, from clothing and accessories to home decor, apothecary, and specialty items. New artisan specialties include items such as twisted jump ropes made on-site and brewery-inspired products.

The event also features a service project with Operation Care Package. Visitors are encouraged to showcase their personal crafting talents by decorating boxes that will be used to mail care packages to our troops overseas. All ages are welcome to participate. Supplies will be provided. Please visit the Downers Grove Junior Woman’s Club tent on the north side of Fishel Park near the playground to participate.

“We hope the community service craft gives residents even more reason to explore the DG Handmade Market” says Anne Healy, DGJWC Club President.

Also new this year is the not-for-profit booth area. Visitors are invited to stop by the booths of several local not-for-profit organizations, including Hope’s Front Door, AAUW, and the Downers Grove Historical Society to learn more about those groups and support their respective missions. “We see this newly branded event as one part arts and crafts, one part community service, and one part fun and fellowship,” says Anne Healy. “We encourage everyone to come check out our new line up.”

Musical acts play on the Fishel Park stage both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday features a Folk Music Festival with Heather Styka, the Matchsellers, and others from 9:00am until 4:30pm, and Sunday showcases a variety of Downers Grove-based groups, including the Downers Grove Choral Society, Village Voices, Cantores Community Choir, and Sinfonietta Bel Canto performing from 12:00p until 3:45pm.

About the Operation Care Package

Operation Care Package is a volunteer 501(c)(3) public charity, dedicated to the mission that no Hero serving our Nation should be forgotten. The organization’s goal is to support Soldiers, Marines, Sailors and Airmen through care packages and letters of encouragement.

About Downers Grove Junior Woman’s Club: The Downers Grove Junior Woman’s Club is a non-partisan, non-denominational, volunteer women’s organization. Its members are dedicated to supporting and raising the awareness of charitable organizations, individuals in need, and the community. If you are interested in joining, or would like to learn more about DGJWC, visit: www.dgjwc.org. Women interested in joining are welcome to attend our next meeting on Tuesday, September 27th at 7:00pm at Emmett’s Ale House in Downers Grove.

Laura Schubert has been sewing since lessons in Home Economics while in high school. She now brings that talent to the DG Handmade Market in the form of hand sewn scarves.

Each of her scarves feels incredibly soft to the touch, with materials from fashion capitals such as Paris, Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles. These materials bring a truly unique garment to the marketplace and Laura loves taking the time to hand pick each fabric. She has also recently added hand knit and embroidered fabric shawls to her collection.

When Mandy Park, potter, is creating she likes to think about how that specific piece can be used in someone’s everyday life and how can she can make it uniquely beautiful. Pottery has inspired Mandy to fulfill her desires of making innovative functional ware with a modern perspective. Please join Mandy at the DG Handmade Market as she shares her simplistic elegance with others for practical use in their everyday lives.

As Owner & Artisan of Nefertem Naturals, Brittany Hogan wants to bring the Power of Nature into daily routine. Her skincare products are made from the best cow fat on earth … grass fed!

Brittany’s grass fed tallow soaps, body butters and balms are nothing like you’ve ever tried before. The tallow is hand-rendered (it’s a dirty job but someone has to do it) and triple-purified to ensure clarity; never bleached, deodorized or refined. Her products are then blended with organic essential oils and organic vegetable oils to produce a powerhouse of essential nutrients to feed and hydrate your skin properly. Eliminate your daily ingestion of toxic chemicals found in most store-bought personal care products by making the switch. All you need for radiant skin can be found in Brittany’s line of tallow soaps and skin care products. Hand-rendered, handmade and produced with positive intention, her mission is to… bring the power of nature into daily routine™ and her products do just that!

After spending many years in corporate America, Michelle Robinson created ArtZings out of love of letters and photography. Nine years later there’s a distinct transition to another love, creating fun art that’s relevant to people and their homes. Loving the challenge to incorporate the love of the art and the merchandising that always pleases the eye, the fun is back!

Initially, with her travel background, Michelle found a way to utilize all of the pictures she had taken and incorporated them into personalized art. Letter photography is the creativity of photographing everyday objects that resemble letters of the alphabet, then putting the photos together to create any name or word onto a customized frame suitable for hanging.

Over time, Michelle has expanded the line to include everything letters. Creating common words with photos into something small and affordable, wood words was born. Single letters to be hung was next and now the 3D is another creative outlet. Michelle hopes you enjoy your art as much as she enjoyed creating it.

Sandy Squillo is a 30-year resident of Waverly Avenue in Clarendon Hills who recently discovered a new passion … manipulating wire. She has named her new venture WOW – Wired on Waverly and hopes that you will enjoy her one-of-a-kind WOW designs!

JC’s Naturals was started in 2011 by Jaden and Jordan Chambers with the help of their father, John. They started with organic hand rolled beeswax candles from a homeschool kit and continues to expand, with all of the products made by the kids, including new jarred candles using unfiltered local beeswax.

Also, they are now making a line of skin care products including lip balms, lotion sticks, hand soaps and sanitizers, bug spray, dry shampoo, sheet/pillow sprays, and body sprays. JC’s Naturals uses all natural, mostly organic ingredients in their products and is hoping to educate our customers in similar thinking.

Jaden will be posting informational updates on their Facebook page a couple of times a week. They are also trying to implement their own reuse program, where you can bring back your containers. They will sterilize, refill, and resell with new product while passing the savings on to our customers. Each container brought back will save our customers 50 cents on the next purchase. Visit their website at https://jcsnaturals.wordpress.com/.

Wondering who you’ll see this year at the DG Handmade market in Fishel Park? So far we have dozens of crafters confirmed, and we’d love to share a few of their stories.

The first feature is focused on the first crafter who officially sent in their registration, Memories of Silver! We are so pleased to have Joe and Gidget joining us this year.

Joe is an artist with painting and metal fabrication experience, including sculptures for over 40 years. Gidget an artist in designing and providing the finishing touch on every piece. Their unique jewelry, yard art, wind sculptures and home deco creations are designed from modern and vintage silverware. This includes metals such as copper, brass and silver. some designs are embellish with stones or crystals. Depending on the item and material used. Items are cleaned, shaped, cut, sanded, polished, shaped by Hand tools, bent if needed for design.

Each individually crafted piece is hand made and designed for elegance and beauty. All Memories of Silver creations are produced using silverware found in estate sales, personal family heirloom collections, and various Western United States antique shops. Joe and Gidget can be found at various Arts and Craft shows in Northern Illinois and other Midwest metropolitan areas.